For decades, this would have been another chapter in the Toronto Maple Leafs’ never-ending playoff horror story. A lead squandered, chaos swirling, and heartbreak lurking just around the corner. Only this time, something different happened — something remarkable.
The Maple Leafs dug deep, stared down their tortured past, and finally emerged on the right side of postseason drama, defeating the Ottawa Senators 4-2 in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference First Round to win the series 4-2 and advance to face the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers.
It marks just the second playoff series victory for the franchise in the past 21 years — and it came in classic Toronto fashion: fraught with near-disaster, hard-earned, and entirely unforgettable.
The unlikely hero? Veteran forward Max Pacioretty, who wears No. 67 — a number dripping with symbolism in Toronto, as 1967 was the last year the Maple Leafs hoisted the Stanley Cup. Fifty-eight years later, Pacioretty’s go-ahead goal late in the third period helped ensure that the dream remains alive.
“That was one of the gutsiest performances I’ve seen from a team that’s had so many reasons to doubt itself,” Leafs head coach Craig Berube said. “But not tonight. Not this time.”
The drama began before the puck dropped. In a near-bureaucratic catastrophe, William Nylander was almost ruled ineligible due to a clerical error on the official game report. Instead of being listed as No. 88 William Nylander, the roster mistakenly had No. 92 — his brother, Alex — who was one of 14 recent call-ups from the Marlies after their AHL elimination. Fortunately, NHL Rule 5.1 allowed the Leafs to make a last-minute correction when the mistake was noticed pregame.
It was a lucky break — one they didn’t get in 2002, when a similar gaffe kept Robert Reichel out of Game 5 against the Islanders.
Fittingly, Nylander opened the scoring, settling nerves with a goal in the first period. Captain Auston Matthews doubled the lead early in the second, and for a moment, it looked like Toronto would cruise to the series win.
But Ottawa had other plans. Senators captain Brady Tkachuk scored midway through the second, injecting life into the Canadian Tire Centre crowd. Then, at 12:40 of the third, David Perron stunned the Leafs when he banked a shot off goalie Anthony Stolarz from below the goal line, tying the game 2-2 — a sequence eerily reminiscent of previous Maple Leafs collapses.
Statistically, history was not on Toronto’s side. Entering the night, they were 1-13 in potential elimination games in the Nylander-Matthews-Marner era — often wilting under pressure. But not this time.
Just 101 seconds after Ottawa tied it, Pacioretty found daylight in the slot and buried a beautiful feed from Max Domi to restore the Leafs’ lead at 14:21.
“Max [Domi] made an unreal play, and I just closed my eyes and shot it,” Pacioretty said with a grin. “I know what that number on my back means in this city. Maybe tonight we changed the conversation a little.”
Nylander, fittingly, iced the game with an empty-netter in the final minute, completing a two-goal performance that almost never happened because of a paperwork error.
With the win, the Maple Leafs now prepare to face the Florida Panthers in the second round — the same team that ended their postseason run last spring. But this year feels different. Toronto didn’t fold. They rose.
Finally, they’re no longer just fighting their opponents. They’re conquering their own ghosts.
